Hotel de Lauzun – Tragic beauty on the Ile Saint-Louis

If you happen to travel toIsle Saint Louis You may have noticed a particularly beautiful building with a golden balcony and fish-shaped drainpipes. Its name is Hôtel de Lausanne and it is one of the most beautiful buildings on the island, in my opinion. And if all that wasn’t enough, if only its walls could talk they could tell you some particularly interesting stories…

The express route between the palace and the French prison

The palace I am talking about was built in the 40s by Charles Gruyn, the son of a wealthy innkeeper. Like any nouveau riche, Charles decided to fill the house with luxurious furnishings so that not a single corner would be left empty. Wherever you look, you will find eagles, oysters, cupids with their hands under their hands, arrowheads and more. And if you look at the ceiling, you will not be bored there either, thanks to the paintings by Charles le Brun, one of the greatest French painters of the 17th century, whose paintings adorn the Palace of Versailles.

Discover the Hotel de Lauzun during the Journées… by mairiedeparis

However, despite its splendor, the palace's occupants did not enjoy it for long, and it seemed as if bad luck had befallen it. A few years after the palace was built, Charles Gruen was sent to prison for embezzlement, after it was discovered that as the food supplier to the royal army, he had not really put his hand in the dish...

The next owner of the palace was the Duke of Lauzun (1623-1723 Antoine Nompar de Caumont, duc de Lauzun), after whom the palace is named. He also did not get to enjoy the palace, but spent 10 years in the prison of Pinerol because he dared to ask for the hand of Anne Marie Louise d'Orleans (1627-1693), his cousin. Louis XIVThe King of France coveted her wealth and therefore did not want her to marry and have children. The Duchess met Monsieur de Luz in 1666 and fell head over heels in love with him, despite his unimpressive height to say the least (at the King's court he was called "the smallest man God ever created"). However, in 1670 Louis XIV refused the Duchess's request to marry her beloved, and de Luz, instead of accepting the verdict, said a few kind words to the King that bought him an express ticket to the Bastille and from there to the fortress of Pignerol, where he shared a cabin with Foucault. Former Minister of Finance of Louis XIV.

The Duchess of Orléans did everything in her power to free her lover and eventually agreed to give up a large part of her property on condition that the King of France free her lover. This indeed happened in 1681 and the happy couple finally married and moved to their home on the Île Saint-Louis. However, their happiness did not last long and the couple began to quarrel until about three years later they were forced to divorce (the Duc de Lausanne was particularly disgusted with the Duchess and often shouted at her “Granddaughter of Henry IV, bring me my boots at once!”). The Duchess of Orléans moved to the Luxembourg Palace while de Lausanne went to England where he became close to James II (reigned 4-1685), who was later forced to flee to France where he ended his life in 1688.

Later, the palace passed into the hands of Cardinal Mazarin's niece and a relative of Cardinal de Richelieu, who in order to marry her had to kidnap her from the convent where she studied. The couple loved to spend money and their balls were known throughout Paris. This emptied their wallets quite quickly, but they did not worry because their relative, the Duc de Richelieu, was childless and was about to leave them a large sum of money. However, to their surprise, the Duke suddenly managed to bring an heir into the world and the couple had to flee to distant London for fear of creditors.

And don't drink hashish on me!

The next owners of the house were less colorful people, so we will skip their biographies straight to 1842. That year, the palace was bought by Baron Jérôme Pichon (1812-1896 Jérome-Frédéric Pichon), who rented rooms from it to the famous French poet Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867 Charles Pierre Baudelaire). The poet's small apartment was on the second floor, which he furnished according to his own unique taste. Baudelaire was, probably, the first total artist in history, a man who lived, designed, and wore his art. This is why his room contained quite a few objects that were considered very strange in his time (emerald wine glasses, medieval-style marine furniture, a Japanese-style table, and more). In this apartment, Baudelaire began writing his famous book “The Flowers of Evil,” which would cause a huge scandal in the next decade.

Who doesn't know the famous sentence of Benzi's mother from the movie Eskimo Lemon, "And don't drink hashish for me!" So Baudelaire definitely listened to his mother and didn't drink hashish there. He simply turned it into a kind of greenish jelly and... ate it. And so the "Club de Hachichines" was created in his apartment, when quite a few intellectuals of the period stayed with him and tried the drug with him. Among the intellectuals who participated in the hashish evenings were the poet Théophile Gautier (1811-1872), the writer Honoré de Balzac (1799-1850 Honoré de Balzac) and the painter Édouard Manet (1832-1883 Édouard Manet), and they were joined by a number of more or less questionable women.

One of them was Baudelaire's lover Jeanne Duval (1820-1862), who was called the "Black Venus" because of her Creole roots. Jeanne lived On the street of the "Headless Woman" Not far from the palace and with her, Baudelaire spent the best years of his life. However, in September 1844, this period ended after Baudelaire's mother discovered that her son had managed to spend 44,500 francs of his inheritance in two years (a very significant amount in those days). She decided to transfer what was left of the inheritance to a notary who divided it into very low monthly payments. Baudelaire in response attempted suicide by cutting his wrists and was fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on who you ask) saved by Jean Duval. A few months later, he was forced to return to live with his mother. The glory days of the Île Saint-Louis were over...

Hotel de Lausanne today

In 1928, the city of Paris bought the palace and turned it into a historical monument, and the place was open to the general public. However, since 2013, the place has been taken over by the Institute for Advanced Studies, so it is not at all easy to get inside, let alone see the rooms in all their glory. How can you get in anyway? One option is to try to get an invitation to one of the conferences that are held there frequently. Another option, and easier to do, is to come to Paris in September and enter the palace during the “Jours des Patrimoines” (Heritage Days). In this case, walk through the rooms, admire the beauty, listen to the stories, but… don’t drink hashish on me!